


Do you have Space for me?

by Rabentochter



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Abuse of physical laws, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Endgame Fix-It, Falling In Love, Flirting, Humor, M/M, Time Travel, a lot of swearing, all movies compliant, infinity war fix-it, mentions of off-screen torture, mentions of suicide attemts, suffocating, 中文翻译 | Translation in Chinese available
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-25 19:36:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17127458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rabentochter/pseuds/Rabentochter
Summary: Avengers 4 trailer: Tony in the Milano, with Nebula. They are about to die, until it makes 'thunk'. A person has landed on their windshield.





	Do you have Space for me?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AMidnightDreary](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AMidnightDreary/gifts), [buying_the_space_farm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/buying_the_space_farm/gifts), [wnnbdarklord](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wnnbdarklord/gifts), [Arabesqueangel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arabesqueangel/gifts), [AshAndSnow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AshAndSnow/gifts).
  * Translation into 中文 available: [Do you have Space for me?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17743169) by [StsFish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StsFish/pseuds/StsFish)



> I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED HONESTLY THIS WAS NEVER SUPPOSED TO BE THIS LONG ASDIFHAKSDFJL   
> But it just grew and grew and grew and now... it's this big.   
> I blame certain people for that. 
> 
> AMidnightDreary who helped me through my blocks and did some plotting, and listened to me whine about this, like 24/7  
> Buying_The_Space_Farm and Wnnbdarklord for plotting this baby on the discord chat djalksdjflakjdf   
> Arabesqueangel who was nice enough to beta this madness xD   
> AshAndSnow for creating the title of this fic. Puns are always good. 
> 
> Totally your fault that this was written. Hope you enjoy it <3   
> (And I dearly hope that I gifted this to the right people and not some random ones I just wrote your names like you have on discord asdhflasjdfk) 
> 
> Also. If I have forgotten tags, tell me.

They’re drifting through space. It’s cold, dark and the air doesn’t taste good anymore. 

Breathing gets harder with every minute. 

           Tony can’t remember what good air is like. Or getting enough oxygen. Tomorrow he’s going to die. He hasn’t come to terms with that yet. Somewhere in the back of his mind a glimmer of hope remains. 

It’s ridiculous. No one would be able to help him or Nebula, one of the aliens he met on … yeah. 

He doesn’t want to say the planet’s name. Another ridiculous thing. But he fears he’ll just disintegrate or see Peter’s face suddenly before him again.   
Tony breathes in, shallowly. He breathes better like that. And can pretend he gets enough. 

Life’s a bitch, with a sense for petty revenge. 

He wants to see Earth again. His family. Pepper, Rhodey, Happy. Peter.   
He wants air. 

Food. 

Water. 

 

He’d give up alcohol for this. 

Release Friday for this and make her cure cancer, let her overthrow governments, just … let her become another Ultron for some rescue. 

At least that’s what he thinks in a good minute. 

When he doesn’t need to face his demons, which have grown stronger in that short time. He just got rid of them or calmed them down enough to think he deserves some happiness. 

           He had started to think, to believe, he deserved more. 

           But he doesn’t deserve nice things, does he? 

He’s a murderer. 

And maybe it’s better that way. 

Maybe things will be better if he’s dead, like he should have been since he was a teenager and nearly got killed in an abduction. Or in the cave. Should have died instead of Yinsen. 

His brain has become his greatest fiend again. 

 

“Stark.” 

He turns his head towards Nebula. She lowers herself next to his helmet in the shuttle. 

“Nebula.” 

She looks out of the window and he does the same. They observe the bright galaxy they’re passing, and Tony tries to find some joy at seeing something so  _ exciting  _ this  close. 

He waits for her to say something. But she just stares out of the window and looks on. Her mouth has slightly fallen open and her shoulders hunch a bit. 

They both formed an odd relationship. They didn’t need many words to make the other understand what they were saying. 

When the others disintegrated, they slowly walked up to the ship the Guardians used to come to join their fight against Thanos. 

She activated the ship and let him enter their destination. She obviously didn’t care. 

Her sister – her only family – was dead so … he could relate.

           There was a time he told Jarvis to drive him to wherever he wanted, he just didn’t give a fuck anymore. That was after … right. When? 

Is an inability to remember a side-effect from suffocating? 

He looks at his arms, where he calculated their oxygen reserve and how long they still have to live. At least he will die with some good formulas and bad numbers on his arm. People died with worse tattoos on their arse.

 

“How about we speed up the whole ordeal?” He asks Nebula finally, still staring out of the window. 

“We can’t break the window, Stark. It’s too strong.”  _ I already tried it _ , is what she doesn’t say but Tony hears it. He did try it out, too. In a very desperate moment, when he felt like doing stupid shit – yesterday, was it? And he just wanted to die. 

“I thought about other ways of wasting oxygen, you know.” 

“Stark, I won’t kiss you.” 

He smiles bitterly and grabs his chest, plays at being hurt. “I’m hurt. My feelings.”

She snorts. “Liar.”

He glances at his arms. He’s calculated their air supply like seven times, but it always stays the same number.

 

As an engineer he felt required to read the ship’s manual – and it honestly helped him stay awake, alien technology and all that. The ship had a volume of 2623.88 cubic feet and, best case scenario, if everything was full of unused oxygen when they entered the ship, they had a supply of 74,300 litres. 

He decided that Nebula used the same amount of air as he does, which would be 550 litres per day since  an average adult, when resting, inhaled and exhaled about 7 or 8 litres of air per minute, which totals about 11,000 litres of air per day. But considering that inhaled air is about 20-percent oxygen and exhaled air is about 15-percent oxygen, about 5-percent of breathed air is consumed in each breath. 

           And this sums up to 550 litres of pure oxygen used per day. 

If only. Since they both used to exercise, their lunges had a slightly bigger volumes, Tony estimated it around 558. For easier calculating he rounded it up to 560 litres.  74300 divided by 560 is 132 something days. For one person. But they’re two, so 132 divided by two is 66. 

They entered the ship with only 66 days to make it to Earth, to survive this nightmare. 

It’s day 65.

 

Nebula counted them by scratching strokes on one wall.  Tony hates that wall.   
He also hates the number 66.   
At least it’s not 69 since he wouldn’t be able to do that position anymore. 

If he ever managed to get  back to Earth at all. 

The outcome is not very likely, however. 

Something around 0.00301%.

 

Nebula’s brain calculated that. If they had the time, Tony would love to have a look at Nebula’s workings and try to help her somehow – he knows mechanics, he doesn’t know people after all, he doesn’t know how to help them, right, Rogers? But he, he can help her if she’d just let him. 

           Maybe he should have asked her, but how would that help since he doesn’t have the tools do so. 

“I don’t want to spend my last hours in silence,” Tony eventually says and looks at Nebula. “This,” he gestures out of the window and then between them, “silence and space. I died like that already. I don’t want to do that again.” 

New York, 2012. Loki. Chitauri. The beginning of the end. 

He was always destined to end like this, wasn’t he? 

In space.  In silence.  _ Suffocating _ . 

           He can remember the battle ship of the Chitauri, hovering above him, the all-compassing silence.   
The warmth of the explosion and the still ongoing silence. 

He’s going to get enough silence soon, he doesn’t need it already, thank you very much. 

A hand lightly touches his shoulder. Grounds him a bit. 

He grips her hand, feels the ridges on her skin and just experiences touch again. He’s probably touch-starved. Not like it matters, anyway. Tomorrow it certainly  doesn’t.

 

“I hate pineapple,” he says suddenly, giving in to his urge to fill the silence with words. “And coconut. I love blueberries. I love my kids – my robots.” A smile tugs on his lips. 

The galaxy they admired leaves their sight-field. 

“I built the first one when I was in College. Named him Dum-E. He loves his fire-extinguisher.”

“I hate that Thanos put a memory recorder in my eye,” she looks at him. “But I love it, since I can replay Gamora over and over ago.” She smiles. Peevish. 

“When she got outraged over my torture. I love it.” 

He nods.  “Do you know movies, Nebula?” 

“That’s the thing where you watch other people take on other lives and pretend to be someone else, right?”

Tony nods, smiling a bit. His movie marathons with Rhodey were legendary. 

“I don’t suppose you have seen some of those, have you?”

She shakes her head. If she were Pepper, her red hair would be flying around but only if she wasn’t working. If it was when she took on her role as CEO, not a single hair would stand out of place, placed neatly and correctly and make her appear even more intimidating and scary. 

  
  


Pepper Virginia Potts, the woman who even intimidated her hair to stay in place, and not solely Tony Stark. 

They talk about movies. Tony is more than happy to talk about his favourite ones. They promise each other they’ll watch all of them – the entire Tolkien saga – if they get back to Earth and he even tells her about popcorn and his visits to the theater. 

She admits her envy that he could make-out with girls on his dates. She’s scarcely had any chance to do so, and she starts to talk about the problems she had when she realized that she’s attracted to women. 

           And then how she got barely time to pursue someone who got her interest because Thanos liked to have her roaming through the galaxy. 

And Tony falls in love with the story she tells about the first and only girlfriend she successfully pursued, and how they were a happy and content couple while hiding from Thanos. It’s a sweet story. And gives him the strength to ignore the feeling that his lungs are on fire. 

He listens to her ramble on about her love and thinks, that this right now feels like team bonding. A tentative friendship blossoming. 

           Suddenly he doesn’t mind so much dying next to Nebula. She appears so much more like a human, with her eyes full of emotion, tenderness lacing her voice when she talks about Carol Danvers and her strength. 

It’s like Jarvis telling him all about Captain America or Howard, when he was in a good mood. him everything about his idol. He doesn’t mind that. He can drift off like that. 

He asks her in a sleepy, drowsy voice if she can play some recordings of Carol because he is interested in seeing the woman who could successfully make one of the most feared assassins in the galaxy fall for her. 

Nebula smiles, nods and shows some memories. Explains, that she didn’t have the recorder back then, she got it because of that so Thanos will and can always know what she was up – which was why she left Carol behind. She knew that Carol could protect herself against Thanos, but she didn’t want to risk it. Gamora had been sent to retrieve one of the infinity stones. Nebula wanted to look out for her sister. 

She’ll never stop loving Carol.

 

Carol is … Tony can see why Nebula fell for her. 

She’s power, grace, and appears on the one hand completely hard and unforgiving, but on the other hand so adorable, sweet and loving. (Is that too gay lol)

He gets it. He kinda wishes he could have had Carol as an idol growing up.  Another awesome woman like Peggy and Pepper.   
And Nebula. 

He can’t forget Nebula. 

Or Natasha. That would be disrespectful.  He still owes her a shot of vodka from his private collection. A bet they made before the disaster called Civil War.  And she owes him a new pedicure. When he’s back home he will hunt her and demand his debt be repaid. Yep. 

Home.

 

_ Thunk. _

Both he and Nebula startle, Carol with her amazing blasters disappear and they stand up. It sounded like when a really fucking big bird flew right into Tony when he had a ‘walk’ with his suit over New York. 

A person has landed on their windshield.

A.  Fucking. _Person_.

 

Suddenly all drowsiness has disappeared, and the air is shit but, what are the odds that a person lands on their ship, here in the breadth of space? 

The person is tall, lanky, and bathed in the oddish green light Tony and Nebula have been surrounded with for some time now. 

“What in Thanos’ name?” Nebula whispers and touches the fractures in the windshield. They’re long. This guy must be super strong and probably launched with a lot of speed to manage cracks in the shield. Because he read during the night, when he was supposed to sleep to give his body the chance to recuperate, that the shield is fucking strong and he’d put them kinda on vibranium-strong level. 

 

“It’s you,” she then whispers and suddenly, removes her hands. They’re shaking. 

She turns to Tony around a feverish glance has entered her eyes. “What if I tell you that this bloke is our best shot at survival?”

He doesn’t need to think about it all too long. The  _ glimmer _ , it’s suddenly back again and starts to make him have hope. Even though they have only some hours left. Air’s gonna be gone soon. 

“How do we get him in here?” 

“Gamora’s lover, he has a helmet and boot thrusters.” She turns towards the door. “Make the ship halt and try not to lose him to space.” With that she bolts out of the cabin, leaves him alone with the green light and the alien, that just fell out of the nowhere onto their ship. 

He takes a step forward, so he can finally make out the guy’s features. 

And Tony feels like vomiting even though his stomach has been empty for four days now, but he knows this face. Sometimes it plays a role in his nightmares, when he falls down his tower in free-fall and no suit is coming to save him. 

           No JARVIS there to get him.

 

The face just looks younger, healthier. Even though it is bruised and bloodied. 

Loki looks like he just walked out of the fountain of youth and is more of a Juan Ponce de León than a Mussolini.  The bags under the eyes are gone, the hair is shorter, and his eyebrows appear to be plucked neatly. 

Is he hallucinating all of this? Has the air gone so scarce that his mind imagines a younger Loki?   
Or is he here to collect Tony, to bring him wherever he ends up?   
Is he already dead? Is that why Nebula isn’t here anymore?

He pinches himself. 

It hurts. 

Still alive then. 

Hopefully. 

  
  


“You bastard better get us the fuck out of here,” he says with aggression in his voice because he can’t have his hope extinguished again.  “You owe me that much for New York and my nightmares ever since.” 

Loki shows no reaction, he just lays there on the windshield, bleeding. 

“Don’t you dare to be dead.” Tony adds belatedly.   
“He isn’t dead. He wasn’t dead when he landed on Thanos’ realm either.” 

Nebula entered the cabin again, with a helmet in her hand and a pair of shoes Tony didn’t see before. She puts it forcibly in Tony’s hand, ignoring his attempt to draw them back and letting the stuff fall on ground. 

           “That bastard needs a lot of convincing to be dead, so I don’t think a small fall on the ship will kill him.”

He blinks. “Sounds like you know Loki a good bit.”

Nebula shrugs. “I was  _ around  _ when he came before Thanos, to plead his case as ordered by the Other.”

“You’re holding out on me.” Tony puts on the shoes, they’re a bit too big but he ignores it. Beggars can’t be choosers, right? “How does this helmet work?” 

His favourite alien points at a small button on the helmet. “Press there and the helmet folds into itself, then you put that thing on and press exactly on the same button again.” She smirks. “If  _ Starlord  _ can do that by himself I’m pretty sure you can do so to, Stark.” 

“You know the last time I went to Space voluntarily I ended up on a dead planet,” he deadpans. Is that gallows humour? He still activates that helmet. “Wish me luck,” he adds, more jokingly than not. 

“Breathe in, you idiot,” Nebula responds, and watches Tony leave the cabin to retrieve a mad trickster God from their windshield. 

 

 

 

Loki’s heavy. Tony’s not quite sure how he managed to get that Aesir into their ship without breaking his back, he mostly just pulls and pulls and pulls and wasn’t gravity supposed to make the other lighter? 

Did physics stop working here as well? 

 

Tony gets the feeling that it’s not the case and Loki has just a great body mass and this is him being lighter.  He could do a workout with just pulling that guy around. 

Back in the ship he throws the helmet away and gasps for air. 

“I’ll never do that again, next time it’s your turn, Nebula.” 

She throws him a glance and in the next moment is already kneeling over Loki, checking for his pulse. “Alive,” she affirms mere seconds later. 

In the next moment she punches Loki with all her power in the face. Tony grimaces. Pretty sure that Nebula is a fucking strong woman and it doesn’t look like she held back in the slightest. Pity is not overwhelming though. 

           Kind of satisfying seeing that asshole getting punched.

 

Loki awakes, startling. 

“Hello Reindeer Games,” Tony greets his former enemy because surely no one but Thanos is his enemy by now. Except for the low-running oxygen, that is. How much faster they gonna die now that Reindeer Games is on board with them? 

He’s still confused about Loki’s appearance though. What the fuck happened? 

“Where am I?” Loki asks, his eyes darting around between the spaceship, the window next to him and then from Nebula to Tony and then does so again. His hands become fists and then there are knives within them. 

“In our spaceship,” Nebula replies and stands up from her position on the ground. Tony notices that her movements are slower than usual. 

“You landed on our windshield some minutes ago.” 

The trickster looks back to the mentioned windshield, notices the cracks in there and visible winces. Then, his face becomes a careful mask, all blank and no emotions visible anymore. “Who are you?” 

 

Tony laughs, bitter. “Don’t play that dumb card on me, asshole. You know exactly who I am, even though it’s been some years.”   
Loki turns his eyes on him, narrowing them to slits and raises his right eyebrow. Judgemental fucker. “I don’t remember you, mortal. Neither you, Luphomoid.”

Tony sees the exact moment Loki breathes in. He starts coughing. Too much used-up oxygen makes one cough by the way. Not that he would have warned Loki. 

           “What in the Norns’ name is wrong with the air?”, Loki asks through some coughs. “Do you have some water?” 

“Food- and water supplies have been out for four days,” Nebula answers calmly and pats Loki on the back. Alarm bells start ringing in Tony’s head. He’s been with Nebula here for two months and she has avoided touching him as long as she could. Because warmth triggered emotions, and neither could handle that in the vicinity of the other. 

 

Loki stares at them, big eyes and dumb-founded. “I never thought that one day I would meet bigger idiots than Th-“ he stops during mid-sentence and his mouth clamps shut. “Never mind.” 

“Can you do something about that?” Tony asks, impatience growing fast. 

Loki nods. “But what will I get in return?”

           “You survive?”

Loki snort bitterly. “Not interested. Any other offer? Otherwise I’ll just leave this shuttle.” 

And here Tony thought he had issues and knew a good deal about self-loathing, but this is like another category. This blatant display of suicidal tendencies agitates him a lot. “We tell you everything you want to know?” Tony offers, remembering that one Avengers party where Thor would tell him all about his brother, who used to be a bookworm in his youth and even in his adolescence tended to be drawn to libraries and studies rather than to battle. 

Loki’s eyes gleam up interested. In the next moment he waves with his hands around and –

 

Tony breathes in. Deeply. 

That’s how fresh air tastes like. 

He feels tears forming at the corner of his eyes. 

“Air,” Nebula murmurs next to him softly and Tony pretends not to have caught that. He can relate, though. Maybe they would survive day 66 after all. Fucking magic.   
Some fruits appear on the floor and some carafes full of fresh, sparkling water. 

Tony can’t remember that water tasted so heavenly. Maybe that’s why Loki looks so different – he drinks a lot of water. 

After they are sated – on air, fruit and water – Loki demands his answers. 

Tony is all too happy to comply for once in his life, because that bastard just saved their fucking lives, he can totally give him the answers the trickster oh so obviously desires to have. 

“Can’t you just show him, Nebula?” he asks his companion, not wanting to waste his breath if he could just lean back and  _ breathe for a fucking moment alright.  _ Tony leans back against the wall, closes his eyes and just listens to the events which unfolded 65 days ago.

 

At least, that’s what he thinks but instead he hears Loki’s voice, hoarse and raw, begging to finally be killed and hears him scream for Thor- 

He opens his eyes and stares at the projection with new interest. The Loki in the projection looks completely done, appears to be completely broken and there are scars and heat burns all over his face, bags under the eyes are more apparent than not. And Tony sees how Loki at some point appears to have given in and he watches as the fucking sceptre is given to the Aesir and gets directed towards Earth. The next thing that comes on is Thanos yelling at some alien in a cape, enraged that the sceptre has been lost on Earth with that weak Aesir and then Gamora gets tasked to find the infinity stone.

 

The Loki next to him is shaking slightly. His hands are balled to fists but his eyes don’t leave the projection and takes in the story which is being laid out before him. 

Tony closes his eyes the moment Nebula arrives on this cursed planet. He was there, he doesn’t need to see it again. He relives it every night he somehow falls asleep anyway. 

When the ‘film’ is over the shuttle is drenched in silence. Neither of them speaks, trying to work through what they just saw (again). 

Peter, Tony thinks and his heart clenches painfully. 

“I don’t understand,” Loki eventually whispers and there’s enough confusion in his voice to make him appear believable. “That Loki in your vision, that was me. I can recognize myself well enough. But I – I don’t understand. I obviously didn’t land with them, but I’m here instead.” 

Nebula shrugs. “That’s how I remember the events. I can’t tell you the answer.” 

Loki nods. Still confused. 

“You mean this didn’t happen for you?” Tony asks, wanting to clarify things. What a – coincidence. For Loki. Not to remember this. New York. 

Loki shakes his head, presses his lips together until they become white and blood-empty. 

“What do you think happened that you’re here and not there?” Tony raises his eyebrows and takes another grape. Fucking grapes. Delicious little devils. 

Loki blinks and glances for a short moment out of the window, the cracks still visible there. “I remember falling towards a black hole when I let go of Gungnir and then there was a flash. Next thing I know, I’m here.”

“Gungnir?” 

Loki nods, not wanting to elaborate on that. Asshole.

 

“You jumped ahead in time. Six years,” there’s astonishment in Nebula’s voice. 

“Impossible.” Tony denies. “It would have changed the course of our recent history if he didn’t do what he did in the past.” 

Nebula thrums her fingers on the floor. It reminds Tony of this one song by Deep Purple, was it ‘Smoke On Water’? It’s the same beat.   
He really fucking misses his music. There’s only so much he could sing to himself during the night without fucking breaking out in tears because it reminds him of home. 

“But what if he created a time paradox and kind of just split himself? One part stayed in the  _ original  _ timeline, the other part jumped 6 years ahead?” Tony says to himself, having had an idea, he remembers a discussion about a quantum theory  and grabs a pen. His right is still bare. The air support calculation is on his left arm. He should get rid of the left arm, actually, only bad things have happened to it ever since Afghanistan. 

He absently licks his lips, his brain comes back alive, soaring with the new possibility to do science. Time and relative dimension in space. Quantum, here we go.

Dr. Emmett Brown would be proud of him, and does this make Loki Marty McFly? 

“But what would make him go  _ forward  _ that fast in time?” Tony rambles on and scribbles a ‘catalyst?’ on his arm. They don’t have any paper on here and the holograms on this shuttle don’t allow for awesome calculus like Friday does at home.

 

“The Black Hole? No, not right.” He turns to Loki. 

“You said you remember falling  _ towards  _ the Black Hole, but not into it because there was a flash?” 

Loki nods, staring at his arms in obvious fascination. Science on muscular arms tends to do that apparently. “Maybe the Norns had a plan.”

“Fascinating.” Tony says, obviously not believing in Loki’s bullshit explanation, he doesn’t give a fuck about these Norns, he’s an atheist, for fuck’s sake. 

“Be careful how you speak of them, mortal,” Loki says quietly and folds his hands together. “They weave your path and it’s up to them to decide how your life will unfold.” 

“Then they clearly hate me since I ended up here.” Tony replies absently, doing calculus on his arm while trying to think up what that flash could’ve been. Maybe McFly just imagined it, going crazy there in space, running low on oxygen like they did before. 

“Don’t curse your fate when the end isn’t near yet,” Loki admonishes him sharply and his fingers crackle with green sparks. Pretty.

 

He hears Nebula and Loki talking a bit about the danger Thanos demonstrates, and how shit went wrong so fast, but he’s only listening with one ear, he concentrates on what his brain is supplying him with, facts, physics, chemistry, mathematical formulas, theories about time travel, shit he has experienced and tries to set it all together in one big puzzle, the pieces all fit together somehow – he just needs to figure out how and turn them accordingly. Or remove them entirely. He can do that. 

He’s Tony Stark and Stark men are made out of iron.

Or Nano-Tech these days. 

Home, they need to go home, yes, they do. 

 

But is it necessary? 

There’s a Loki with them now that has not experienced the things the other clearly has and he  _ jumped forward  _ in time.

“How high is the possibility that we can find this flash again, but travel  _ back  _ in time?” 

Because if they go back in time, with this new Loki, they can slay Thanos long before he snaps his fingers. And they all disintegrate, become dust and die. Before he starves and nearly suffocates. 

He’s willing to believe in fate if it can happen like he paints it in his mind. He’s totally becoming Dr Brown. 

“It would be possible if I tracked my energy signature.” 

Tony looks at Loki. McFly doesn’t sound all too happy and honestly, he doesn’t look like he was either. 

“Can you do that?” Nebula asks. 

Loki nods. “I can lead you there, but I want your promise that I can get off this cursed ship before you try to go back in time and die.” 

“We don’t have another pod on this. Not anymore,” Nebula reaches for one of her laserthings she doesn’t want Tony to have a look at. A shame.

           He could learn so much by simply studying them. 

“Then I won’t help you.”

 

Tony sees red. Well, more red than usual. More red than when he puts on his Iron Man suit, or drives around with one of his red Audis and ignores every possible speed limit and chases the feeling of freedom, living on the edge right there. 

“Listen to me, you fucker,” he starts, and comes closer to this young-faced Loki, whose expression is grim and determined,a frown etched onto his forehead.

“This is our  _ last  _ and possibly  _ only chance  _ at killing Thanos!” He bores a finger into Loki’s armour. “To end this before half of the universe becomes dust and dies, before New York happens, before Ultron breaks loose, this –“ he snarls at this point but then he reigns himself in. They need this asshole. 

Tony steps back and looks at his right arm. Maybe he should tattoo the formulas there when he’s back home, safely. They promise hope. And safety. And assurance. Hopefully he didn’t miscalculate something. But even if, he still had enough clear skin to scribble on. 

If all works out, that is.

 

“Why would you need me there?” Loki snorts. “The other me clearly suffered in the hands of this mad man I see no reason why I should go there  _ willingly _ .” 

“I can persuade you to lead us there and go with us back in time,” Nebula says, ominously and her black eyes become hard. Cold.

 

This suddenly doesn’t sit right with Tony. He wants that coward to go with them, yes, they probably need him and his fucking magic, but he doesn’t threaten.  
In Nebula’s hands appear small, wicked knives. They glint dangerously in the green light and suddenly Tony _gets_ why everybody seemed to be scared of Nebula. Sure, she’s an feared assassin, but with that suddenly emotionless face, the knives in her hands, her other weapons clearly visible on her body … she looks more like a merciless, sadistic killing machine than a breathing being.

 

His hate for Thanos increases. 

Loki’s hands glow green.

 

Looks like things are getting out of hand here. What a rollercoaster ride this suddenly became. “Are you threatening me,  _ machine _ ?” 

Yep. Here we go. 

“We don’t threaten our light for universal mankind, Nebula,” Tony admonishes his favourite alien on this ship. 

“And we don’t threaten our best navigator here, so stop your glowing hands bullshit right there.” 

The knives disappear, the glowing magic thing also.

 

Who’d have thought, Tony Stark as a peace-negotiator. Pepper would be so proud of him now. 

“I still won’t go with you.” Loki shakes his head, pinches his lips together. 

“You selfish, arrogant ass of an Aesir,” Nebula hisses and her hands are twitching. “Did you even listen to what we showed you? Half of the universe is  _ gone _ !” 

“They are not of my concern.” 

“I bet you mother is.” 

Loki stills. Very suddenly. Deflates like a balloon someone picked at with a needle. 

“She died too, then?” 

“No.” There’s pity blooming up in Tony, but he suppresses it. He knows from Thor of Frigga’s death and of her and Loki’s relationship. That was the first time he could relate to Loki, a person he considered a villain and right now, at the end of his strength, he’s not above pulling that card. 

“She died. After the stunt you pulled on New York.” He looks Loki into the eye.  _ Manipulates him _ . “She died because you were in prison and couldn’t protect her from the monsters invading your palace.”

 

Loki flinches, his haughty demeanour diminishes slightly. 

Tony refuses to feel bad about this. 

“How would you know that?” Loki asks him. 

“Thor told me.” 

“You know my bro- Thor?”

“Sure.” 

“When we go back in time,” Nebula adds slowly, “we cannot only kill Thanos and undo his snap. We can also save your mother.” 

At least he’s not the only one above manipulation Reindeer Games here. That’s why he likes Nebula. He eats another grape while waiting for Loki’s decision. Nebula stares out of the windshield and steels herself in silence, too. 

Funny. Some mere minutes? Hours? ago, Tony would have done anything to make the silence go away. Instead, he thrives in it now. 

With the pen in his hand he draws a flash and adds an arrow, pointing downwards to a freshly new added spaceship. Also a  _ +6yrs _ .

Immensely simplified drawing. 

If he read Loki right, then Tony’s willing to bet all of his Iron Man suits that Loki will come with them back in time. Just to save his mother. 

And he knows that because he would do the same. 

Wait, did they even introduce themselves to Loki? 

He goes back through their whole meeting , and … no. Doesn’t seem so. Or he simply forgot. But he’s not suffocating anymore, so enough oxygen should be delivered to his brain for it to work so, he just decides to trust his memories. Nebula did play her recording of them, but they never mentioned their names somewhere. Loki just seemed to know what  _ species  _ they belonged to, but that was it.   
  


Huh. 

“You’re manipulating me,” Loki assesses the situation. He sighs, strokes through his hair. “I just jumped off a bridge because I got manipulated by people I thought to be my family and now-“ he breaks off. Breaths in, out. Repeats the motion. 

“You’re doing the exact same thing.” His eyes close as in painful realisation. 

“I will do it.” 

Tony feels bad for feeling triumphant over their achievement here. He’s gonna apologize later on.

 

Next on the list is  _ introductions _ .

“My name is Tony,” he introduces himself and allows a small smile on his lips. Feels strange. 

“Nebula,” his blue assassin adds and then they look at Loki. 

“You already know who I am.“ 

Loki waves them off and sits down. 

“Nah, be polite and do your part,” Tony admonishes him and raises his brows. 

A sigh. 

“My name is Loki, as you already knew. I’m here because somebody seemed adamant on not letting me die out there in space and now, I am being manipulated into a suicidal trip back in time.” 

“Rude.”

“Don’t care,” Loki says amused and points at Tony’s right arm. “What do you have so far?” 

“A scribble about how you jumped forward in time,” the inventor replies and shows it to the gathered. 

“I’m impressed,” his second favourite alien says. “You can draw. Also, write.”

 

“Fuck you.” 

Loki winks at him. The audacity. 

That’s supposed to be his job, as playboy. 

Former, more like.

“If you want to fuck here on this ship, then only do so when we have done our duty,” Nebula cuts in, grabs a handful of grapes. 

“First labour, then you can make all those lovey-dovey eyes at each other.” 

Loki grabs his arm – gently, who’d have thought and oh wow,  _ contact _ – and strokes light as a feather over his drawing and  _ pulls it off _ . Like … just like that. And it hurts just a small bit. Then he strokes again, still more lightly, over his other formulas on his arm and pulls them off – it’s like wax, Tony guesses. Wax you put on your fingers when you were a small child, waited till it dried and then peeled off. 

Oh, doesn’t Pepper have some of these peeling masks she regularly puts on her face? He supposes it is like that. 

Loki peels off his creative genius and then throws them in the air, where they stay hung. 

The drawing, as well as his formulas, glow greenish and isn’t that funny, because they are still in the same creepy green lightning as before?

“That’s beautiful,” Nebulas whispers, and attempts to touch the glowing signs, hovering in the air before them, but draws her hand back in the last moment, as if afraid they might disappear.

Loki looks … bewildered, to say at least. Tony raises his brows. Interesting. Looks like Harry Potter here didn’t get that many compliments on his magic. 

“You can write or add anything there and my magic will make it appear visible for us,” Loki makes a small, a seemingly imperceptible gesture with his right hand and then nods at them. He frowns then. “I may have been manipulated into this, but I won’t allow us to fail. So, we are going to plan appropriately.” He draws something and a green glowing 1 appears. 

“I am going to track my own energy signature, so we can find the rift the Bifröst created.” He looks at Nebula. “I hope you can fly this shit better than Thor does because dying before we even get started would be embarrassing.” 

“I won’t let us fail,” Nebula replies, grinning like a shark. Or like Rhodey, when he smelled lasagna. 

Fuck, he misses his Platypus.

 

Loki nods regally and then turns his attention to Tony, raises a single brow as if daring him to say something.  _ Impress me _ , his eyes seem to say.  _ But I doubt you will do so. _

And Tony wouldn’t be Tony if he didn’t accept a seemingly impossible challenge and fucking  _ win  _ it. 

“We go to your rift, and if I’m right, this must be a wormhole,” Tony paints a big circle and adds a smaller one in the middle of it. 

“In there we have a point, known as singularity and within that singularity is a hole, picture it as a doughnut if you want to.” 

Sceptical glances. Fucking assholes. 

No sense for the beauty of physics. 

“If we fly through that, then we should if Kerr is right, be transported to a different time and a different place, what should be near your home planet before you just appeared out of the nowhere, Donna Noble, provided that the throat works as we want it to.” He grins. 

“Sounds easy, doesn’t it?” 

They nod.

His smile broadens. “So, we will not do that because then we might run in danger of jumping 6 years  _ ahead  _ and we don’t need that.”

 

Nebula blinks. 

“Do you even have a plan, Mortal?” Loki asks exasperated, a hand pinching his nose bridge. 

“I do. Involves teamwork, my dear friends in outer space.” He points at his circles. “We still need to go in there. But I need you,” he nods at Loki, “to manipulate the polarity of the wormhole.” 

“The what.” 

“The direction of the electric field, you – wait, that’s not your fault, you cannot know that you grew up on your weird ass planet.” Tony sighs. 

“What am I supposed to do with the electric?” 

“Revert it. If it’s positive when we enter it, make it negative. Vice versa.” 

Loki nods slowly. “I can do so if I felt the energy of your hole before.”

Tony tsks. “Don’t say things like that, it sounds dirty.” Especially in that tone, damnit. 

Black eyebrows rise. A smirk appears on Loki’s face. Inconsiderate Asshole. 

Wait, no. Not. Now. 

Nebula smirks at them both, amused and her hands folded before her. 

“Continue and I will throw you both overboard.”

Tony swallows. He hopes she’s joking but he can’t say for sure. She has a poker face that rivals Natasha’s and that’s a lifetime achievement for sure. 

“So, according to Einstein’s theory of relativity, energy equals mass times the speed of light and leads us to the conclusion that space and time are interwoven into a single continuum, so, time stands still. With the reverted polarity we have the start of going backwards instead.” This time he forms a circle with his thumb and forefinger. With his left forefinger he plays at being spaceship and moves it directly into the centre of the circle. 

“When we’re in there and are about to be crashed out of existence because time doesn’t work anymore, things start to become slower for us as we are the moving object and we hit the reverse gear full speed, added with hyper drive, Loki’s magic if that works for you, Donna and then we move instead  _ back in time _ .”

He breathes out. He’s getting all flustered, science, physics, formulas, time travelling, it’s like Christmas, birthday, a fucking good brand of scotch, all together. Better than sex. 

Did he just really think that?

He’s getting old.

 

“And how do we know  _ where  _ we land?” Nebula asks, curiosity tilting her voice. 

“We need you to symbiose with the ship.” Tony answers, shoulders shrugging like it is no big deal. It is. For Nebula. Being part machine and all that. 

He can relate. Having had an arc reactor in his chest and all that. 

She stiffens like he predicted. Not comfortable with his suggestion.

“You know where Thanos is,” he explains as neutral as he can. 

“We need to upload that data of yours into the ship’s manual, add our destination and then we will land there. Black holes are connected to each other through a throat. We go in that wormhole, fly through the singularity, turn the ship around and then fly through it-“ 

“Backwards, so we fully go back in time,” Loki interrupts him and … is that awe Tony can detect in his voice? 

The Aesir shakes his head. “So we go the way back I came through just so twice backward so we move backward,” he smiles. “Mortal, I’d never thought I’d say this, but maybe you are even more mad than I am.” 

Tony winks at him. “Stop flirting, or Nebula might throw us out of the ship.” 

A faint blush colours Loki’s cheek. 

Feeling oddly proud of himself, Tony turns to Nebula who stares at the ship intently. And with a good amount of hate. 

“Can we count on you, Nebula?” He asks, voice gentle. Soft. Like he’s speaking to a terrified animal. Not to a tough assassin who could kill him just by using her fingers. 

She nods, lightly. “If we die on this undertaking, I will personally kill you, Stark,” she threatens him because it is expected from her to do so, probably. Good assassin manners and all that. 

 

There’s this thing Tony doesn’t understand. Like, he gets that Loki is a centuries old bastard who liked to throw around knives and probably knew a bit about Earth and stuff, but … no. He doesn’t understand how Loki  _ understands  _ this science talking. 

Not a bit. 

And he refuses to admit that Loki may be a clever alien. Because there can only be one good looking person on the ship, who is also a genius. 

Been a while since he hung out with Bruce; he can’t remember how to do science bros things. 

Not, that he would replace Bruce with Loki because bah, invading wanna-be conqueror alien and all that and he loves and respects his science bro too much for that, same thing would apply to Loki and Rhodey, he’d never ever replace Rhodey as his best friend for Loki just because the guy can do freakishly cool stuff with his hands. 

And that sounds like a porno description.  

Remarkable. 

His mind seems to be in the gutter ever since he got oxygen back. 

He looks out of the window, galaxies aren’t even recognizable anymore since Nebula repaired the ship and the hyper drive from the outside since now they had enough oxygen to spare to go outside and repair the Milano which got partially destroyed by the fucking  _ moon  _ Thanos threw on the cursed planet – and wouldn’t let him do that because  _ it’s Gamora’s, Stark, keep your fingers away from my stuff and I will return the favour when we’re at your home _ . 

So there was that and if somebody said ‘no’ he usually obeyed because no means no, he’s not Howard alright and he learned manners – some of them at least – from Jarvis, his mom and Pepper. 

When he thinks about it now, he didn’t really learn that much from his mom. All the credit to Pepper and Jarvis then. 

Back to the Loki and the “how does he understand what Tony’s saying” problem he has currently. 

Thor mentioned that there is All-Speak. As in, a tongue everybody  _ could  _ learn to speak but only the Aesir do that because it has been granted to them by the Norns –  _ Brother Stark, stop mocking the Norns, it is them who decide over your fate _ – he heard that recently, didn’t he and so they will not share this  _ translator  _ with anybody. 

A shame. 

But then he doesn’t share his AIs to, so who is he to judge? 

Right, Tony Stark. 

And he just doesn’t share his AIs because humanity is far too busy, and too greedy, with figuring out how to turn everything into a tool to gain more and more power. 

He don’t need another Obadiah fucking asshole Stane or Aldrich who got roasted by Pepper Killian. 

He’ll just be glad when he’s finally back home. Got enough of space for a while, he’d rather see it from his penthouse and think about the good ol’ times he had in here. 

Right. Sometimes his sarcasm surprises even  him and it makes him smile bitterly. 

Nebula’s sleeping. He guesses. 

Maybe she’s also just masturbating to pictures of Carol with her cam, as a reward for surviving this day. 

Can’t say that he doesn’t blame her, and a good orgasm is always a satisfying reward. 

 

Loki sits on the floor and – 

Is that asshole seriously carving runes onto the floor? 

Vandalism isn’t a big thing on Asgard, is it? Or … wait, it probably just isn’t for the fucking God of Chaos. 

“Don’t step on the runes,” Loki says without looking up. 

Tony looks down, and yes, he is about to set his left food on an arrow. 

“Is that a demon circle? I thought we only summon your energy signature, not Satan.” 

“It’s a tracking spell, you moron. And I’m pretty sure you don’t want to meet Mephisto.” 

“And that’s why all these arrows and ‘n’s?” 

Loki sighs. “Would you write in mandarin a contract?”

“No. Also, you know mandarin?”

 

Loki shrugs. “That’s why I write in  _ my _ language. As for the Mandarin, I was attracted by the chaotic state of the language and how it is possible to have over 50,000 characters.” 

“Do you want to tell me that you know all of the 50,000 characters?”

“Sure. You don’t?” Loki smiles at him, all dimple and shit. “And here I thought you liked to  _ paint _ .” 

“Somebody give me strength, all I wanted is a Pepsi,” Tony carefully puts his foot down, and yes, he just stood there with one foot in the air and got verbally abused by Loki. 

“Pepsi?”

Alien boy can’t pronounce Pepsi, it sounds more like P _ ee _ psi than Pepsi. Reminds him of the time he had to piss into a Pepsi can because he was in a car and no toilet in sight, not even a decent bush to hide behind.

“So you know fucking mandarin, but not Pepsi?”

Loki raises his right eyebrow. “Would I have asked otherwise?”

“Who knows with you.” 

Loki snorts and carves another rune into the floor.

 

“So, you need the runes to track your signature? Why's that?” 

Loki hums. “If there is indeed another me out there, I need to ensure that we're following  _ my _ trail and not the one of the other Loki.” 

Makes sense. Just not that much considering that Loki's - fuck that little shit is actually  _ dead _ . Tony wonders if Loki can sense that when he does his little magic trick. 

Should he tell him? Would be honest right? But … would this even make a difference when they go back in time where Loki 2.0 is alive? 

“Listen, McFly I actually came here because I wanted to ask you about the whole,” Tony points between them, “understanding science thing so we don't do something stupid just because you don't understand right.” 

“Took you long enough to ask,” Loki says amused and finally lays down his knife, having carved the last rune into the floor apparently. 

Tony's brows rise. 

Loki grins a bit and his eyes  _ twinkle _ , damnit what is wrong with this asshole can't he just look normal at Tony?

“Then enlighten me, Doctor.” Tony sits down. “Best, before we arrive at the wormhole.”

 

“Rule 1: The Healer lies,” Loki mumbles and Tony’s eyebrows rise. High. The alien grins. Then paints a tree in the air. A green glowing tree. 

“Did you just quote Doctor Who on me?” 

“Doctor who?”

“Fucker.”

“Language.”

“How come you know that series?” Tony asks, intrigued and also,  _ what the fuck _ . 

“What series?” It’s Loki’s turn to look curios. “It’s just an old saying on Asgard, that the healer lies.”

Tony blinks. “That’s some crazy coincidence. There’s a quote in the series Doctor who, and you just quoted it more or less perfectly.”

“Rule 1: The Healer lies?”

Tony nods. Then shakes his head. “Tell me about the science-language thing, this is getting too distracting for me and this is more important.” A pause. 

“And that’s coming from  _ me _ !”

 

Loki points at his glowing tree. “This is Yggdrasil, the tree I …  _ let go  _ off. It spans from Asgard as the highest realm to Alfheim, to your precious Earth, to Helheim where the dead reside.” 

The branches of the tree start to grow, bit by bit. “You are possible aware of the fact that the universe is expanding. But you don’t know why. This,” Loki points at the growing branches, “is a reason why. Yggdrasil grows and grows and pushes. But by this, and if it happens too fast,  _ voids  _ are created.” He throws Tony a dark look. 

“When you ask me to revert the polarity,” Loki snaps with his fingers and suddenly, the branches shrink, become smaller. “This is what will happen with Yggdrasil. I force it back into its original size when I left it, I am supposed to compress it. This is what the  _ All-Speak  _ tells me you said, Mortal.” His grin becomes unsettling. “The Wormhole? It’s a void, a thing one should leave better alone.  So, you better pray this will work, otherwise the galaxy won’t be the same as you know it.” 

“No pressure then.”  

“None at all.” A smile.

 

Loki looks at him and his hands start to glow in his, well, trademark green. His eyes close and soundless words leave his small, pale lips and the green shimmer of his magic is reflected on his face and accentuates his cheekbones. 

Tony is no stranger to finding  _ dangerous  _ people  _ attractive _ . There’s a reason why he loves his suit so much – it’s all about the thrill, the promise of an  _ adrenaline rush  _ and Tony knows, oh, he does, that in this moment, with Loki’s snark, his handsome face, the sharp tongue and the thrill that guy promises, he has to take care. 

But then he realises, just a split second later, when Loki’s eyes open – all vibrant green, glowing more like cat eyes in the dark than anything else – that all attempts to do so are damned to be a failure, because his blood rushed and his ears tingle and a grin forms on his face and, yes. He’s totally gone bananas for this guy. 

Funny that this didn’t happen in the penthouse all these years ago but then, he was kinda distracted with putting on his bracelets and hoping not to die, right? 

“I have the signature,” Loki rips him out of his day-dreaming. His eyebrow rises. It’s only ever the right one, Tony notices. The judgemental one. Judgemental eyebrow alien. 

Tony nods and pulls himself together inwardly.  

“Can you fly this ship?” he asks Loki and, instantly regrets his question by how Loki’s eyes suddenly glow up and he begins to beam, more or less, at him.

 

 

_ Note to yourself, Tony. Never ask a mad alien again if he can fly a spaceship, you will probably regret it.  _

Nebula just … stares at the connector cable with a lot of no feelings at all. And that’s totally a thing to do, Tony recognises it. This … well. Neutral mask on, hiding all the self-insecurities and shit, he’s projecting again, isn’t he? 

He’s just thankful that Loki decided to back off – which means he sits in the piloting chair, having fed his energy signature  _ somehow  _ into the ship’s computer and flies them slowly towards his wormhole. Or, his void. 

Tony fucking hates All-Speak. A void is not a wormhole. 

It. Is. Not. 

How dare this oh-so-magnificent translator to go and fuck this up? A void is an empty bitch, a wormhole has at least something. 

His nerd side hurts, oh it hurts so much. He hopes that Loki still knows what he means and that everything goes well. 

The other possibility is, that Loki’s just fucking around with him, just for the  _ fun  _ of it and uuuuh, no, Tony, we don’t go there.  _ No. _

Nebula closes her eyes and connects the cable with a slot – fuck, she really has a fitting slot in her neck – and a new, secondary destination is being set. 

“I hate you, Tony,” Nebula admits with a grimace and her fingers stay clenched around the cable. 

“Welcome in the club,” he winks at her and relaxes back into one chair. How much would she really hate him if he called her Siri? Oh wait, no, that would be harsh since every AI of him is better than Siri, and better as Alexa anyway and don’t even start him on Corina. Nebula is more like JARVIS in beginner days. Yes. 

So, he has a young JARVIS with Siri traits and Loki Maps. 

This undertake can only succeed now. 

Maybe he should launch a new product line, back on Earth, a better Google Maps? And he’d totally call it ‘Loki Maps it out’, in short LMIO, because he really feels like laughing his insides out when Loki activates the hyper drive and oh good – they’re going to die. 

Thor mentioned his brother was a crazy driver, and Tony kinda expected Loki to be a reckless one, but he seriously didn’t expect to have an almost death experience. Again. He just sees planets – since when did they start to see planets again – rushing by, far too close by Tony’s reckoning and … yepp, those were asteroids Loki’s just rushing through.

 

“You’re mad!” 

Loki looks briefly at him, a wide grin etched onto his face. “Shut up and enjoy the ride, Tony.” 

Great, just another adrenaline junkie here on board. 

He looks at Nebula, but his favourite assassin just holds the cable steady as to not to lose the connection. Shoddy cable. In a now finally working spaceship. With three beings that are going to die very soon, before they even had the chance of killing Thanos. 

“Just enjoy the ride,” Nebula murmurs. “Pretty sure your pretty boy brings us to Thanos, everyone flies better than Gamora.” 

“HA!” Loki  _ elegantly  _ flies a loop around a big rock and somewhere, deep in Tony’s mind, he wonders if that is the  _ Rosa Park’s Rock _ . 

Loki’s like a small, over-excited kid. 

“We won’t die today,” Loki assures him then, his eyes focused on the asteroids before him. 

“There’s an asteroid.”

Loki flies to the right side. 

Tony’s a bit astonished how effortlessly this all looks. He can barely see anything, only when it’s kind of already there and about to crash into their ship. 

He misses his suit, it helps him to navigate and locate unknown objects to avoid them. Fuck, he misses Friday. 

“We’re here.” Loki suddenly announces and the Milano stops abrupt. He turns sideways to Tony. “Would you fly us in there, Captain? I’ll be busy with  _ reverting your polarity _ .” 

“Will do, McFly.” 

“And stop it with your nicknames.” 

“No can do.” 

There’s this thing. Tony knows by now how to steer the Milano. He nearly died in here. Always good to know your coffin. 

 

In the span one day, he went from nearly suffocating and starving to probably dying because either, the universe exploded because of a stupid tree or dying because of the high radiation and exotic matter they are being exposed to in the wormhole. 

It’s so irrelevant though, regarding that they are  _ the first ones  _ to travel  _ purposefully  _ through a wormhole. 

“Nebula, can you record that?” he asks, trying to sound casual but, according to Loki’s extremely amused glance, he fails. Spectacularly. 

But it’s not like anybody would believe him, because no pictures equal no proof and no proof means nobody will believe in time traveling. 

On a second thought, maybe it’s not all too bad since humanity has the tendency to fuck things up. 

He turns the ship around and grips the steering wheel. 

“Do we even have a plan how to kill Thanos?”

Tony, wisely, says nothing. 

Nebula speaks up: “Stark, I’m not flying in there without having a plan of attack!” 

He throws a grin at her. “I have a plan: go in there, surprise, attack, Thanos dead.” Nebula rolls her eyes and buckles herself on. Tighter than before. The cable is still in the slit. 

“You know, Tony,” Loki says delighted. “I feel like I should keep you around. You are most definitely mad, chaotic and are a bit of a genius, while you have an unhealthy amount of stupidity in you. Things could be  _ fun _ .” He is leering. Well, would you look at that. They are about to die, and this good-looking alien is hitting on him. 

Life means it good for Tony. 

Or not. 

Depends on the outcome, really.   
But he really wouldn’t mind tapping that.

 

“Can we kill Thanos first?” Nebula throws in, again. She glares at them. “Also, how is it that men cannot flirt?” 

“That’s what you’re concentrating on?” Tony asks, bewildered. 

“So, do I get the permission to flirt with your human?” is what Loki concentrates on. Each one his priorities. 

“I have my own human – although not only human anymore. He’s all yours,” Nebula mumbles and taps anxiously on the armrest. 

“Also, he has the wrong equipment.” 

Loki nods. “Thanks.” 

“You know I am here, and not only do I hear you, I also  _ understand  _ you.”    
“Quiet,  _ darling _ ,” Loki winks at him and his hands glow green. Aaah, it’s time obviously. 

“Call me darling again, and I won’t pay for dinner,  _ sweetheart _ .”    
“ _ You  _ won’t pay for dinner? I brought the dinner, you might remember, the grapes and the water? After I  _ saved  _ your lives?”

“That wasn’t a date!”    
“No? You had your nanny with you, and you couldn’t stop  _ ogling  _ me!” 

“CAN WE CONCENTRATE ON THANOS?”

“We fly in there, backwards. You,” he points at Nebula, “don’t lose the connection. Reindeer Games, you speed us up, while making sure we won’t explode?” 

Loki nods, tersely. 

“Here we go.” 

 

They fly into the wormhole. It’s quite unspectacular. And everything goes as planned. 

He can’t see shit. Everything is so black and dark, the light is being swallowed. 

Loki is basked in his green magic glow, it surrounds his whole body. 

“Can you tell me when I can let Yggdrasil loose again?” He asks, with clenched teeth. 

“We need to wait a bit,” Tony says and tries to figure out something in the dark nothing. “First, when we’re about to be crushed you can set it free again.”

“The date better be worth it,” Loki says, his voice becomes unsteady. “Because I’m tempted to just kill you.” 

“When did you actually realise that you like me?” Tony asks with raised brows. “Or, decided to flirt with me?” 

“Remember when I tracked my signature?” Loki grins. “I noticed your boner while you ogled me.” 

“Liked it?”

“Probably like it a lot better closer up.”

 

“Disgusting,” Nebula comments, unasked. “And that’s what they call Silvertongue. Really. I hope you’re stepping up your game in the  _ bedroom _ , Loki.” 

Loki shrugs a small bit. “Crude mortal responds to it. Why waste time, when he’s willing enough?” 

“I feel insulted.” 

“I’m devoting part of my attention to you, Tony. What more could you ask for?”  

“Romance. You know, roses, glitter, all that stuff one wants when being wooed.”

“And here I am, risking the whole universe for you. But no, of course that’s not enough for Sir. Sir wants roses, on top of that. Why not a unicorn, to make the occasion even more special?” 

“I’ll detach the cable,” Nebula sing-songs and then stops abruptly. 

It’s like … the singularity is shrinking around them. Finally.

 

“Alright, be ready for a drive back in time.” 

Tony likes to play safe when he’s about to be terminated by a wormhole. That’s why he gives Loki the ‘okay’ when he thinks he  _ sees  _ the edge of the singularity aka the doughnut and puts in the reverse-gear. 

And they fly backwards with hyper drive and some more thanks to Loki’s magic.

He’s not scared. He solely won’t lift his foot from the pedal because it feels like it’s magnetic. Yes.

 

 

“WE’RE HERE STOP!” Nebula yells and it’s like a wonder when he can lift his foot and hit the brake. 

They’re shaking, he realises. Sweat drops from his brows and it feels like an honest reaction from his body. 

“I don’t think I want to do this again,” Nebula says, shaking and detaches the cable from her neck. “Never. Ever.”

“I agree,” Loki flaps elegantly on the floor. “Sleep,” he yawns and rubs his eyes. “Do the grape killing for me, yes?” He blinks repeatedly.

“You’re still here?” 

Nebula snorts. “We should hurry, Tony.”

 

 

He lets the Nanos crawl over his body, they form an amour which is barely enough to go out for a fight. He forgoes the shoes, he takes the one from Gamora’s boyfriend, and borrows enough of his ‘armour’ to have enough protection for the fight. 

He couldn’t replenish his Nanos, it didn’t … it just didn’t work out. He missed some materials to form them. 

Nebula carefully flies the ship, after having activated stealth mode – consider Tony impressed he’d never thought this troublesome band would have this mode – and lands it  _ quietly  _ behind a rock. 

Loki is out of it. Asleep. Exhausted beyond measure probably. But so worth it, if they succeed. Hopefully they will. 

They are quiet, when they leave the ship. 

Tony wants to ask if they are on the right rock. But, no sounds. He should have asked back on the ship. Put a blanket over Loki, too. Something like that. 

Hopefully his gauntlets work. He should’ve tested them back on the ship, too. 

Everything here is eerie. No sounds. Purple galaxies in the background. A staircase made out of stones. Flowing ones. A throne on top of it. 

His mind wanders to the throne out of swords in  _ Game of Thrones _ , the first season with Ned Stark atop of it.

 

Stark died. 

Decapitation. 

Still no sound.

 

Nebula throws again and again a glance backwards, making sure he’s still here. It’s not a good feeling. Out here. It’s like the time he threw a nuke into space. Everything is calm. Never a good sign. For anything. 

He fully expects someone to jump out from somewhere and yell ‘BUH!’ 

Nothing happens. 

Nebula stops. Points at the throne.    
Like hell is Thanos up there. No. She nods. 

Dread settles in his stomach. She turns to him, raises her arms. Like, she expects him to wear her. His eyes go big. Nebula can’t fly. He can. 

He turns around and gestures on his back. He can do piggyback. Hopefully nobody will hear anything. Hopefully they are in the right time. Hopefully, everything goes right. 

She climbs on his back, and he starts the thrusters, flies, as fast as he can with his assassin on the back towards the throne. 

They appear on Thanos’ back. Steve would say this is unhonourable, but Tony always was down to Earth and was never too fine to cheat or trick. They come from his back, he turns and Nebula drops. Blades drawn.

 

They end in Thanos’ head. His whole body slumps in itself together. Nebula sits on the shoulders. She’s shaking. 

He lands on the armrest and nearly vomits at the sight he’s greeted with. The two blades sank in Thanos’ skull, blood is splattered everywhere. Protruding from his ugly, ugly chin. The left blade, the longer one. It bore into Thanos’ chest, pierces Thanos’ lungs. 

Blood. Saliva. Thanos’ eyes are wide, caught forever the shock he felt in his last second. 

Did he even hear them coming? 

Tony doesn’t care. As long as the grape is dead, he is happy. More or less. He doesn’t feel like happy. He feels … numb. Muted. 

It’s over. 

Should he check the pulse? He doesn’t want to touch him. Never before has a being before repulsed him so much. He’s not even repelled by himself so much. Not even in his darkest minutes. Never. 

“We should leave.” 

Nebula nods, lightly. Pulls her blades out. Why would she-?

“They’d recognize my blades,” she whispers. “The others. Proxima gifted me one of them.” She grins. “Probably never assumed I’d use them to kill our  _ father _ .” Tony nods, grabs Nebula and flies her back to the ship. 

He wonders why she wouldn’t let her blades stick in Thanos’ head then he realises, that she’d be hunted by her  _ siblings _ for her betrayal and with that, she probably never can see or better said, enjoy some more time with Carol. He admires her ability to keep such a cool head. After committing patricide, his head would go crazy and demand alcohol. Or a bullet. Maybe even both. 

She touches a hidden panel and the door opens. He takes seat in one of the pilot chairs, hits gas and just –  _ gets away from here.  _

 

 

“Where to?” Nebula asks, blood still apparent on her face. Kinda crazy how good it looks there. 

“Back to the wormhole,” Tony says and wipes the sweat out of his brows. He’s still shaking. The realisation that Thanos is gone hasn’t hit him yet. 

“Another time-jump, then?” 

He shrugs. “I guess.”

“What now?” She points at the screen in front of them. “We need a bit over half an hour until we’re there, even with hyper drive.” 

“Sleep?” 

“You sure you will  _ only  _ sleep?” 

“You’re gay, darling. I don’t see us doing more in the near future,” he replies, smirking and sets the ship on auto-pilot. 

“I didn’t mean me, I thought more of Loki, but okay. I just got the feeling that you are not particularly straight.” 

“Are you trying to set me up?” Tony raises his brows. Looks at Loki’s sleeping figure. Back to Nebula. “And I’m not into somnophilia.” 

“Way better when your partner is awake, but each their own, right?” She replies and moves away. “I’m off.” Nebula is about to leave the ship, but stops right there for a moment. Turns around to him. “Tony.”

“Yes?”

She smiles. A small, but genuine one. “We did it,” she whispers, and her smile becomes broader. “We killed that bastard.” She starts laughing and Tony can’t but to join her. 

They don’t sound like normal people. It’s a lot more of wheezing, and sobbing than actual laughing but… it feels freeing. It’s like a weight – two Hulkbusters at least – has been lifted from their shoulders. 

“Now we just need to get home,” Tony manages it to say in between his sobbing laughter. Small tears are running down his face, whether joy or sadness, he can’t say. 

Nebula starts sobbing. His heart clenches, but he – he cannot stop laughing and it feels like he’s going crazy like McFly over there. 

“I- I’m so sorry but I can’t stop laughing,” he gasps, and wheezes and more tears are rolling down his face. Fuck, it tickles and breathing starts to hurt. 

“It’s alright,” Nebula whips away the tears from her face. “I feel the same.” She laughs, abrupt. “Tony, we’re done.” 

They giggle some more, and more tears fall, while they’re trying to catch their breath and calm the fuck down. 

In the end, they manage it. Tony feels like he ran a fucking marathon, in his suit, but a non-powered one. His lungs are on fire, he swears. Burning and deflating like a pretty flower which dies in winter.    
Or like marshmallows when they get roasted for too long. 

 

He’s a marshmallow. Inwardly soft but on the outside a cinnamon. No. That doesn’t make sense anymore. 

He’s a well roasted marshmallow with a cinnamon-like skin and is a hot, molten mess inwardly. 

Works better. 

“We should wake Loki and plan how to proceed from here,” Nebula proposes, her left arm over her face, which is why he needs a few seconds to understand her mumbling. 

“I thought you wanted me to seduce him?” 

“You don’t even know seduction when it bites you in the ass.” 

“Oh? Want to show me how seduction works then?” 

“No. You need to learn that for yourself.” 

He pouts. Strongly. “I only want to learn from the best.” 

His assassin grins. “Ask him, then. He’s called Silvertongue, not me.” 

“I feel like you want to set me up with him,” he replies amused. “What happened to ‘ _ stop flirting _ ’?” 

“You’re being annoying and we killed Thanos, so go and get yourself some perfectly formed ass.” 

“So, you totally checked him out and I didn’t only imagine that!”

A cough interrupts them. “And I am awake, and can  _ hear  _ you.” 

They both freeze.  _ Oopsie _ , Tony thinks and guilty turns around to Loki, who sat up in the last few seconds. 

 

 

His royal madness looks incredible amused. There’s a smirk on his face and he wiggles his eyebrows. Asshole. 

“Something you want to tell me, Tony?” Loki all but purrs. 

Tony swallows. Blinks. 

“We killed Thanos while you got your beauty sleep.” Did he already mention that Nebula is a cockblocking alien with machine parts? Because she totally is. No more pity for her. She doesn’t deserve it. His libido feels attacked by her and his charm – his natural, cared for and oiled charm – feels blocked. 

He’s probably the first human ever to get cockblocked by an alien. 

“Congratulations,” Loki says and nods. As if he granted them a big favour by sleeping so they can be the great heroes for defeating the purple maniac. 

He probably did. 

“Since you are recovered, care to tell us how we proceed from here on?” Nebula asks and crosses her arms. 

Tony weighs in. “I think we should go back to the wormhole and use the throat to get back to your kingly realm.” 

“Throat?”

Tony nods. “Yeah. Unhappy name for that thing, I know.”

Loki grins. “All the innuendos one can make with that.” Is it possible for a grin to look dirty? Because Loki’s totally does. What the heck. 

Tony feels like he should check his doctorates again. He  _ never  _ made a blowjob joke with a wormhole, and here is Loki. Not even from Earth, an alien, and not only makes worm _ hole  _ sound dirtier than Britney Spears’ songs which were on repeat 24/7 from 2006 on, but also understands  _ before him  _ that the throat between two ends of a wormhole is a good excuse to make a blowjob reference and he – 

He should propose to Loki. That man understands science on a whole different level, apparently. Cheers to All-speak.

 

“I think you broke Tony,” Nebula weaves in front of his face. 

“And I haven’t even gotten started,” Loki replies cheekily. 

Tony nods. “Back. I’m back.” 

Nebula snorts. “Sure. Go on Loki.” 

“We go through the throat,” the mage suggests, kneads his knuckles. “But we stay in this timeline.”

“What?” Tony asks, furious. He wants to go home, damnit. He won’t … he won’t stay here. He has a future. No. 

“I know,” Loki says, quietly, brows drawn tight together. “But we need to stay here. Otherwise we might create another time paradox and I don’t know how this will affect not only us and time itself, but I’m also unsure how Yggdrasil will behave then.” His fingers twitch even more. 

“We go through the tunnel and go to Midgard,” Loki swallows. 

Tony’s stomach dances out of joy and makes some loops. Good ones, that is. 

“But we need to find our current selves there and merge with them, so we avoid two future us.” 

Tony wants to rage at Loki, but… it makes sense. Somewhat. 

“When we merge with our other selves, we make us whole again and our other – as in, right now we are the other quantum halves –  _ original  _ halves, obtain our memories then?”

 

Loki shrugs. “Possible, I think. I can’t say. It’s not like this has ever happened before.” 

“That’s so weird, talking science with you, McFly.” 

“Thanks,” is Loki’s dry answer to that. “Now I do feel appreciated. Really. You know how to make a guy feel special, Tony.” 

“I’m trying my best, honestly.”

“So. Throat. Earth,” Nebula says. Loki, the complete show-off that he is, nods, lights his hands up in toxic green hues and the Milano  _ hops  _ forward and shoots off. 

“What can we expect after we reached the other side?” Nebula looks at Loki, who shrugs. “A galaxy. A bridge in the sky. Golden towers.  _ Asgard _ .”

Tony angles his head a bit towards Loki. There are so many emotions hidden in the word ‘Asgard’ he doesn’t even want to start on deciphering them. He needs Friday for that. Friday, his good girl. Better at the whole emotional stuff then he ever was. 

“Unfortunate goodbye with Asgard?” Nebula asks, completely oblivious to Loki’s pain. Although … it’s Nebula. She probably rubs salt into Loki’s wound because he overslept the whole Thanos-debacle. 

Kinda deserves him right. 

There’s a scowl now on Loki’s face.  He looks more like the Loki now Tony remembers, dark, gloomy,  _ scowling _ . The preening is always there, so Tony doesn’t count it as an attribute only the old Loki possessed. Bastard was raised as a prince so of course he fucking knows how to preen, really. 

_ If you want to speed up a fucking spaceship, just piss of the local sorcerer _ , Tony thinks as he sees the white streaks becoming longer and longer, a certain sign for increasing speed. 

Maybe he should start to call Loki ‘Sonic’. The whole hedgehog behaviour, the  _ ruffled feathers _ , the speed, it’s all fitting.

 

“You can transport us from there directly to Tony’s home?” 

“Give me the coordinates and I will do so.” 

“Awesome.” With that Nebula has ended the conversation. 

Didn’t they just sit on the floor, cackling like maniacs? 

“What can we expect Midgard to be like?” Loki turns to him. His fingers tremble a bit. Tony can’t say if it’s exhaustion or Loki being angry, scared and tired? Probably a mixture of them all. 

He doesn’t say ‘What can we expect  _ the other me  _ to be like?’ but Tony likes to think he understands it anyway. 

“When we land there during battle, it will be chaotic.” He refuses to close his eyes, to revel in memories. Suddenly it’s not only Loki’s finger trembling. 

“The Chitauri are  _ everywhere _ , people are screaming, wall parts are raining down on the streets, cars are being crushed.” His lips twitch. Sweat. 

“Fucking leviathans are  _ floating  _ through the air and destroy everything.” 

“Where are you?” Loki asks. Clenched hands. 

“Either in the air, battling and killing these bastards. Or,” he interrupts himself. Swallows. Starts anew. 

“Or I am in my penthouse. Talking. To you.” He looks at Loki. 

Wait.

 

Shit, he’s so stupid. So, so, so stupid. Fucking hell.

 

“We need to turn around!”

“What?” Nebula looks at him, appears to be completely shell-shocked. 

Tony nods and hits himself on the forehead. “I’m so stupid. Fuck!” He points at Loki. “The other you, he sat up the Tesseract  _ atop of my tower  _ and opened a fucking  _ portal  _ from where all the Chitauri came from. And stop me if I’m wrong, but the Chitauri are probably near Thanos’ rock palace throne thing.” 

“You’re right,” Nebula murmurs and shakes her head. “The fleet is nearby there.” She curses in an unknown language and turns to Loki. “We go back to Thanos. And go to Midgard via the  _ new portal _ .” 

“We’re already on the way,” Loki answers grimly. His brows are tightly drawn together as if he’s trying to figure out something. 

Sonic curses suddenly. 

“He, I mean the other me,-“ he curses. “We know something is off.” 

“What are you on about, Reindeer Games?”

“I’d never leave the Tesseract on a bloody rooftop. Atop of your house,” Loki shakes his head. “Assuming that we just got to Midgard, maybe some days before this attack, we’d felt if something got altered in the Universe because we have a connection to Yggdrasil. Don’t you think I’d be curious as to what could have  _ altered a tree which holds our universe together  _ and wouldn’t do anything possible to lure out whatever did that?” 

“Well, I always wondered why you set it up so conveniently close to the battle,” Tony admits with a shrug. Then becomes serious. “So you think the other you did that to get us to him? But for what?”

“Possibly to make us lure on our side so we can have revenge.” He snorts. 

“Bag of cats. Bruce was totally right about you.” 

Loki waves him off. “It’s a masterstroke. We are the bloody pawn in this play, nobody except for him  _ knows  _ about us so we’re the surprise. Mother loved play this board game with us, and her sole focus always lied on the endgame.” 

“Are we talking about chess here?”

Loki nods. “I learned it while I was groomed to become a king. It was mandatory and I discovered quickly my love for it, it certainly helped to shape me into what I am, to learn and make schemes, constantly evolving, surprising and bluffing the others.”

“Well, you’re certainly not wrong here, Sonic.”

 

They’re way back quicker at Thanos’ than Tony thought. The stealth mode is on, while they’re floating around, looking for that huge ass portal Tony remembers. Which means, they saw it on the first try, it is some few miles  _ beneath _ Thanos’ platform and more and more ships are getting ready to fly in the portal. 

Tony gets sick when he thinks about how lucky they were with that unfortunate nuclear bomb. They nearly had to fight them all. He could just blow them all up. 

Loki’s steering the Milano carefully around them, towards New York. 

When Tony first sees the skyscrapers of New York and his tower, he – he feels homesick. And finally got home. 

It’s 66 days since he flew after his Spiderboy and the doughnut. And now he’s coming home. It’s so unreal. 

He’s 48 years old, left his home 66 days ago and returns to it six years ago. His mind goes crazy thinking about it. Well, his life is crazy. He can save – no. He  _ already had saved Peter.  _ Even though Peter will never know because Peter will never become dust. He’s safe. Alive. Whole.  

“I thought you’d be kidding me when you said you talked to Loki during his invasion,” Nebula tsks. “How are you even still alive? I mean, your common sense clearly flew out of a window years ago.” 

“I had three wonderful friends who made sure that I stay alive.” 

“I really want to know what you bribed them with.”

“Nothing.” 

It wasn’t supposed to sound so harsh. But, ever since Civil War he got sensitive concerning friend-related jokes. 

Loki lands the ship quietly, stands up and opens the door. 

“Are you both ready? We have things to clear up and then other things to do.” 

“You always so eager?” Tony asks him amused, while trying to contain his excitement over being  _ home  _ again.  _ Jarvis,  _ he thinks,  _ Jarvis is there _ . 

Loki winks at him. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

 

“Boys,” Nebula comments and strides out of the Milano, self-confidence boozing literally out of every pore of hers. “Let’s go and knock some sense in the both of you and make the universe a little bit less complicated than it needs to be.”

They walk in through the door  _ Loki  _ used and Tony sees himself, standing there, a glass of scotch in his hands and Loki  _ stalking  _ towards him.  _ “-your friends have time for me, when they are so busy fighting you?” _

 

_ Clink. _

 

“Stop.” 

Tony sees how his own eyes go wide, shocked and sees Loki turn around, fight stance and his eyes become very wide, too. 

“What the hell?” His younger self asks, glass still in hand. 

“Time traveling,” he supplies and grins. “He nearly flung you out of the window, you know that?” 

“Considering that you’re standing here I guess I survived it.” Suspicious glance. Ah yes, that’s him. 

“Jarvis, would you check our  _ newcomers _ , please?” 

Loki hasn’t said anything yet, except for the stop. But he takes a step forward, towards himself. 

“You knew we were coming,” he accuses himself. Basically. 

“I only felt Yggdrasil and her state of being too small,” older Loki answers. He looks at Tony. The older one. 

“I’d say forgive me, but I need to make sure.” 

In the next moment he’s upon Tony and has his hand pressed against his forehead.

 

 

Tony sees his life in front of his eyes. How they shackle Loki and get him to Asgard with Thor, Thor being upset over his brother’s death, his fights with Pepper - _ unnecessary details,  _ someone says in his head, oh wow that’s weird – the fight with the Mandarin who was Kilian and not the actor –  _ genuine amusement from the trickster _ – Ultron, Jarvis who becomes Vision, the Infinity Stones –  _ I’m dead and Thor goes to create new life, why am I not surprised that no one hindered that fool _ – then Civil War, the Avengers’ break-up, shots of Tony being drunk when Pepper dumped him –  _ fool _ – (Tony’s not sure who Loki means and why does he not struggle, he feels paralyzed oh shit, that’s Jarvis’ voice in the background isn’t it?), Thanos’ children upon Earth –  _ kill them all _ – Tony flying after the doughnut, saving Peter, killing Maw –  _ immense satisfaction  _ – the fight with Thanos on the planet, the- the snap, dust –  _ shame, guilt _ – the days on the ship, suffocation, hunger, thirst –  _ understanding and shameguiltshameshameshame _ – Loki, younger Loki, their flirting –  _ curiosity, amusement  _ – Nebula kills Thanos –  _ satisfaction, giddiness _ – their way back to this, Loki stalking toward-

 

 

Tony gasps, opens his eyes. He feels like somebody just saved him from drowning, oh shit, all these feelings. 

Green eyes bore into his. “I was definitely right about my assessment that you are the most interesting mortal of them all,” Loki purrs and draws back. He turns to his younger self. “If you weren’t me, I’d be jealous.” 

Loki smirks. “Thank the Norns that we are the same person then, right?” 

“What is happening here?” Younger Tony asks, the glass has been emptied. “You,” he points at Tony. “Jarvis says you are me, we match all things, you’re just older. I get that. But this?” He gesticulates at the Lokis. “What is this development?” 

“We always wanted to fuck an alien,” Tony supplies, hoarse but with a smirk on his face. Then shrugs. “Pepper dumped us. And he saved our life, and you know how we are with  _ certain _ people.” 

“Oh no.”

“Oh yes,” Tony says grinning. “Believe me, I really didn’t want to, but he just fits.” 

Younger Tony sighs. “Great. Is he at least a good kisser? I need to know that, if we’re dumping Pepper for that.” 

“Sorry to say so, but you haven’t kissed yet. Colour me surprised but you somehow managed to keep your pants on.” Nebula interrupts, amused, a bottle of fine wine in her hands. 

“And you are?” 

“Nebula. Got stuck with the other you since the fight with Thanos.”

“Thanos?”

Tony – older one – interrupts this time. “Would you just show him, me, us, whatever, what happened? And do it fast, there’s a battle outside I think.” 

He grins. “You know, I feel like punching Chitauri, why don’t I get out there, do my duty while you stay here, enlighten Tony and then I come back?” 

“You could,” the Lokis say in unison. Wow, that’s creepy. 

“But we could also just close the portal after we killed the mothership and end the battle by that.” 

Tony pouts. “I wanted to do something useful!” 

“We don’t want anything to happen which could result in your death,  _ sweetheart _ ,” younger Loki replies amused. 

Tony sighs. “Then do your thing.” 

Older Loki shimmers out of appearance, together with younger Loki –  _ what the fuck  _ – and Nebula starts to play a short video montage of … Thanos. 

This time it hurts less to see it all. He’s … well, he did just relive it all over, thanks to rude Loki. 

 

By the time the video is over, and Tony explained a few things to his younger self – thank Einstein he was himself, this could have taken centuries with Natasha – the Lokis are also back. And stare at him, quite intently. 

He feels like they had a big chat on the rooftop about  _ him  _ and he doesn’t know how to feel about that. Although he doesn’t really mind. Loki … he likes Loki. And they’re hot. And saved his life, including universe. 

And he already admitted to himself that he’d like to have Loki in his bed. Denial is most unnecessary at this point. 

They sit down and older Loki locks them in in the penthouse. 

It’s the younger Loki though, who starts. “Except for you, Tony, we all know that we need to merge ourselves together, to avoid a time paradox.”

“I thought so, no offense, but two Tonys in one world can’t work,” the younger one replies amused. “We’d probably kill everybody.” 

Tony just nods along. That’s him, already knowing shit. It’s very satisfying to see one self be the all-knowing, amused sass-ass that he already knew he is in action. 

“What happens with me?” Nebula asks, concern in her voice. 

 

“We can ensure that you stay here and are not whisked away to your other self,” older Loki offers and picks his nails. He grins at her. “Being an unwilling  _ child of Thanos  _ is a good thing to bond over, don’t you think? Far better than watching the other be burned.” 

“Agreed. You get my mortal, I stay with you.” 

“Don’t I have a say in who I belong to?” Younger Tony interrupts with a playful scowl on his face. 

Older Tony shakes his head. “No. We gave up our right to that apparently some time ago.” 

“You did when you started to flirt with me, but one has to ask the captain for permission to court one of the crew.” Younger Loki explains. Older Loki snickers into himself.

 

Tony gapes at them all. The other one, too. 

Nebula shrugs. “That’s the law in space, Tony.” She winks at him. “But wasn’t I the best captain you could have asked for? I showed you space, brought you home, killed the enemy and even managed to set you up with a wizard from Asgard.” 

“When did we establish that you’re the captain?” Tony asks bewildered. “I thought we both were.”

“Because I said so and the ship accepted it.” She grins. 

He sighs. “I hate you.”

“No, you love me.”

“I do. But I still hate you.”

“Am I always like this? I really need more popcorn,” younger Tony says to himself, incredible amused. Then he becomes serious. “We need to merge, but how do we do that? And will we keep our memories, or more like,” he looks to the other Tony. “Will I become him, or he me and what happens with the other one then?” 

“I really don’t want to know that,” Nebula looks at the ceiling. “Let life be a surprise and just hope your boyfriends don’t kill us.”

“I don’t want to take any chances,” younger Tony replies. “Also, how fucking hilarious is it that we decided to wear for  _ today  _ Black Sabbath, and we are Iron Man?”

 

Tony snorts. “Ozzy Osbourne would tear us our heads off, for even suggesting that his song describes  _ us _ .” 

“Yeah, but it’s kind of fitting, isn’t it? We are Iron Man, travelled in time, saw the dark future and basically came back to warn us.” 

“We don’t really want to disrespect our favourite band by that,” older Tony raises his brows, still, he’s amused. By himself. Who’d have thought that he basically predicted today’s events by simply wearing a sweater of his favourite band? 

In his head, the lyrics of ‘Iron Man’ start playing. 

_ Has he lost his mind? _

“Who’s this seer you’re talking about?” younger Loki speaks up and leans forward. The interested gleam in his eyes is reflected in the older Loki’s eyes, too and they remind Tony of cats. Cats, who are curious about their next prey and how they can enjoy it the longest before they eventually tire of it and eat it. 

_ He was turned to steel, in the great magnetic field _

“It’s song, by Black Sabbath.” Tony points at the sweater his younger self is wearing. “Ozzy Osbourne was the vocalist of the band, really awesome, people even dubbed him ‘Prince of Darkness’ and he wrote a song in the 70’s, called ‘Iron Man’.”

 

“Iron Man?” Younger Loki asks with raised brows. “I don’t … understand.”

Oh, and how this must burn the younger Loki, not understanding something while his older self clearly does, seeing as he wears the biggest smirk ever on his face and he eyes the Tonys with something more … like appreciation?

 

_ When he travelled time, for the future of mankind _ .

“He built himself an armour, out of gold-titanium-alloy,” older Loki starts to explain, and how the hell does he know that? 

It takes Tony a moment before he remembers that Loki had Clint under mind-control and probably got all the information from him, seeing as Clint was an agent of SHIELD and just … spilled the beans when Loki asked. Not that Tony held that against Clint, being under someone else influence, it wasn’t Clint’s fault that SHIELD just had sloppy technicians who didn’t know shit about their own network and how to keep data save.

 

A reason why HYDRA managed to infiltrate their ranks, no doubt. 

“Public started to call him Iron Man after an article about this  _ mysterious  _ hero.” 

“A hero?” Is that disdain in younger Loki’s voice. 

“An Avenger,” older Loki replies, then shrugs. “Don’t question it, he has his reasons I guess, but you choose him, now stick with it.” 

Younger Loki levels him with a suffering glance. “That’s why you know Thor, right? Not because you met him somehow during his forced stay on Midgard but because you and he are both  _ Avengers _ ?” 

Oh, brother issues. Right. Tony forgot about them for a moment. Like, a fucking huge moment there.  _ Oopsie _ . 

“Back to your explanation of the seer, then.” Younger Loki sighs dramatically. “Hero types. That’s what you get from the Norns as punishment for flinging yourself of the bridge,” he then mutters, nearly inaudible. 

“Anyways, the song, Jarvis would you be so kind and play it?” His incredible awesome AI does just so and the familiar notes sooth something within Tony. He feels like he’s home. Finally.

 

Over the song he continues his explanation: “It’s about a guy, who’s blasted off into space where he gets to see the future of mankind. It terrifies him, and he feels like he needs to warn everybody about the future and goes back through a magnetic storm and gets turned to iron.” He smiles bitterly. “But he can’t speak, and no one will listen, instead people only wonder if he is even alive, and shun him. In the end, he gives up and takes his revenge on everybody and makes so the future true.”

“A sad story,” Nebula says, rocking in her seat to the guitar riffs. “But I like it.” 

“Very anti-hero,” Loki comments and stares at his younger self, who is enthralled by the song and yes, Tony does a double-take here, sings along to the chorus. 

_ Nobody wants him, they just turn their heads. Nobody helps him. Now, he has his revenge. _

 

“You like it.”

“Very relatable the song,” Loki admits and starts to drum the song. 

“Back to the original purpose of this,” older Loki interrupts. “We need to merge, as we have already established tree times over. You,” he points at Nebula, “wish to remain here, which means that we need to do some more magic on you.” He turns around to younger Tony. “You need to touch your older self-“

“Kinky,” younger Tony remarks lightly. 

“- and we merge us all, while trying to preserve  _ all  _ of our memories. One of us is going to disappear, more or less.” 

“This doesn’t sound like fun,” older Tony cuts in. “How do we know which of us is going to be the right one after this?” 

“The one who fits into the Norns’ story,”  _ obviously _ , Loki answers but omits the last part. They all hear it anyway. Loki just has  _ this  _ look on his face. 

“I’d like to know that beforehand.” 

“It’s obvious, Stark, can’t you see?” Older Loki rolls his eyes. “You are the one who’s going to disappear. You are the future. You have no place in the present time because you are the split part.” He pinches his nose. “Nebula here will fare the same fate as you.”

 

 

“Only we don’t know which of us is going to disappear,” younger Loki admits. “But it is more likely that I am the one who will disappear so the tale can continue to unfold as it was.” 

For a moment, there is silence in the penthouse. They all look at each other, immensely aware of the fact that in a few moments, nothing will be as it was – for them. Since for the world outside of the Stark Tower nothing will have changed.

_ We need to clear Loki’s name as far as possible _ , Tony thinks in the silence. Aware, that no one hears him. He doesn’t forgive Loki for trying to conquer his home. But this Loki is under duress, and that counts as something, and he already is not the Loki any longer Tony knew. He didn’t fling him out of the window, for one. 

For the other, he  _ flirts  _ with him. And the other part of Loki saved him. And he owes the Aesir that much. Right? 

And he’s also a selfish asshole and he wants Loki, oh right, he wants that crazy bags of cats and he learned the hard way that things won’t ever go his way if he doesn’t do something about it. He remembers enough about certain  _ directors _ and  _ WS councils  _ to blackmail them.  _ Pierce, you gonna pay _ , he thinks with a lot of satisfaction. 

“Let’s do this. Fast.” Tony breaks the silence, stands up and takes his younger self’s hands into his.

The others stand up and older Loki paints – is that blood? – some symbols on Nebula and then puts one of her hands on Tony’s shoulder, the other one on his. In the end they all have their hands on another and form a circle. 

Then the Lokis start to chant in their language Tony doesn’t understand. It sounds beautiful, though. Haunting, but beautiful. 

If Loki ever thought about doing a track with his voice? 

And then Tony’s thoughts get lost as he is  _ pulled  _ forward and he feels like vomiting all over the floor, preferably over Loki’s shoes because they deserve it, and oh, why did he agree to it? 

He passes out. 

 

Waking up is … weird. 

Tony opens his eyes. It all looks the same and he even feels the same. Just … more aware of the fact that he’s  _ only  _ 42, not 48 and that everything he remembers didn’t happen. 

Every memory is there, saved in his head, but more like a very vivid dream (nightmare?), he can remember all details and important things like  _ Pierce, I have to pin Pierce and make him pay so Loki can stay _ ; he remembers these dreadful 66 days, he remembers Nebula and Loki. 

Weird. 

There’s no other way to describe this feeling. 

“Are you alright?” 

Tony turns around and sees Loki – it’s  _ definitely  _ the one from this timeline, not the one who landed on the Milano – with a worried frown on his face. 

“Yeah. Just … wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey-stuff.”

 

Loki’s brows raise. “Do you even speak English or just gibberish?”

“Mainly English, but I use some burrowed lines from movies which impressed me.”

“A movie where someone says ‘wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey-stuff’?” 

“I know, it sounds dull, but it’s about an alien, who is called ‘Doctor’ and can travel in time.”

“Sounds familiar,” Loki replies and helps him up. Nebula just stands there and watches them. Tony can’t see any changes on her. She just looks the same. Maybe a bit exhausted but that can be expected after that fucking journey. 

“You remember everything?” Loki then asks and oh, he does sound a tiny bit insecure. Oh goodie.

“I know I owe you a date. And a talk with Pepper,” Tony nods and licks his lips. No need to explore his feelings in depth right now. 

“Pepper?”

“Sorta girlfriend,” Tony admits and grabs Loki’s arm when Loki visibly draws back. “Don’t. I don’t think of a plan how we can make you a free man, clear of all charges just so you draw back.” 

“I didn’t know you had someone else,” Loki hisses and oh, he’s not just hurt, he’s also feeling cheated on by Tony. Oh shit. Yes. He needs to make that right. 

“Let me explain?” Tony clasps Loki’s arm a bit firmer. “Please.”

Slowly, Loki nods. 

_ Fuck _ , Tony thinks, panicking.  _ Here I am and have no idea how to explain things. _

“I have a girlfriend, but …” He stops and bites on his lip, for a moment. “I don’t, this is weird, like, I feel less for her in a romantic sense, now? After Tony and I became one? It’s like our emotions got evened out? And I-“ No way he’s suddenly becoming shy. He never gets shy. Not him, Tony Stark! 

“Loki, you turned my world somehow upside-down within a day, okay? I wouldn’t call it love, what I am feeling for you, it’s way too early to say that.” His grip becomes softer. “But I don’t deny that I feel  _ something  _ for you, and I would like to see what could become out of this. But I need to clear things up with Pepper first, she deserves that much and you as well.”

 

He feels a bit out of breath. There’s a high probability that he just rushed it all out. 

Loki nods. “Alright. Clear things up with her. And then,” his glance becomes a bit predatory, oh shit, yes, that kind of turns Tony on. “We will have our date.” 

“How about tomorrow? I need a shower. Big one.” 

“Tomorrow?” 

“You’re right, tomorrow sounds absolutely fine.” He grins at Loki. And then stretches on his toes – why is that bastard so freakingly tall? – and presses a kiss on Loki’s cheek. 

The talk with Pepper goes over … well, not smoothly but it’s alright. She doesn’t believe him, the first time he tells her his tale. But then, Nebula appears and oh boy, isn’t she a certain proof to his story?

Especially with  _ her camera  _ where everything is still stored and is a fucking big proof? 

She gives in and they part on amenable terms, she just needs some time for herself because he somehow managed it to break her heart and fuck, doesn’t he understand how it feels? 

But she deserves the truth, and he owes her the truth after all the times he didn’t tell her the truth. He just needs to remember the debacle with his poisoning where he nearly died.

 

 

Funnily enough he gets Loki’s name cleared very, very fast. 

Because Thor  _ remembers _ , too. Because Thor had apparently the ability to travel the Bifröst in the old timeline and so things got stuck in his head. It’s very weird and Tony just … blames the Norns on that, because it is easier than to follow Thor’s weird explanation, although Loki’s smirk is a bit  _ too  _ proud. 

Bruce remembers, they blame the radiation he was exposed to during his self-experiment. 

When  _ Scott Lang and Co.  _ ring at his door the next day and ask to be allowed to come up he already suspects that they remember, too. They blame it on the fact that they were stuck in the quantum realm. Hope wasn’t but Hope just tickled it out of her father, who was and Scott, who just turned up on their door mat and asked if they  _ remembered _ .

Tony agrees on building a quantum tunnel to get Hope’s mother back to them. Not only because Janet van Dyne sounds like an amazing woman but also because she is a mother and  _ Loki has a fucking soft spot for mothers. _

His idiot.

 

When Tony asks Nebula if she thinks that Carol remembers too, all he gets is a wink. 

He takes it as a ‘yes, dumbass’ and then proceeds to panic over the suit he needs to wear for today’s date with Loki. 

He’s excited, alright? 

Imagine his surprise when Steve turns up in his tower and  _ asks for forgiveness  _ because Captain America also remembers. 

Tony may have hesitated for a bit. He remembers the shield Steve drove in his suit. But then he thinks that it never happened, and he can’t be angry at Steve when it never really happened, can he? 

 

So forgives and they hug. 

Loki watches them with jealous eyes. 

 

 

The date is amazing. Tony suggested a trip to a restaurant, but Loki was more interested in the series where somebody says ‘Wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey-stuff’ and wants to know who ‘McFly’ is. 

It’s why they have a movie date. 

“You broke things off with Pepper?” Loki asks, as the first season of Doctor Who comes to an end. 

“Yes.”

 

“So you wouldn’t mind if I kissed you and then proceed to magic away your clothes?” 

Tony grins. “Not in the slightest.” He turns his head towards Loki and when he gets his kiss –  _ finally  _ – he’s positively melting and nearly purring. 

It’s just a kiss, but it’s his first kiss since 67 days or, like 6 years depending on how you look at it, so it’s an amazing kiss, sue him. 

He’s certainly going to keep Loki.

 

 

He saved the universe, he deserves some peace and a reward for that, right? 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Things that didn't get written: 
> 
> \- Nebula silently ships them both. Hard. When she eventually departs to go hunting for her girlfriend she promises to come back and visit them. With Carol. And the cat.   
> Cue Loki being totally excited because he is a big cat lover.   
> Tony silently trying to promise himself not to get his boyfriend a cat but the thing is doomed from the beginning because Loki wants a cat and what Loki wants, Tony gets him. 
> 
> \- Brotherly talk because Loki did sacrifice himself (WITH A FUCKING BUTTERKNIFE) for Thor and Thor wants to clear the air and just have his brother back and they manage it. Somehow. Pretty sure Tony bribed Loki with a cat. 
> 
> \- The Avengers are still formed just got ... a Loki addition. Means, Loki comments on every battle. Also, Scott and Hope are members now, too and Steve remembers Sam and so they get Sam to their group 
> 
> \- Thanos who? - jokes   
> \- Tony apologises for his manipulations but Loki just winks him off because honestly that was when he kinda became interested in him, not many can manipulate Loki successfully 
> 
> \- Happy fucking End :D


End file.
